"Sarah, the daughter of James Ensor, borne June the 12th, 1712."-Family Prayer Book.

"1712, June 16. Bapt. Sarah, dau. of James Ensor, of Willingcoat."-Tamworth Par. Reg.

"Sarah Dyer, died Sept. 1760, aged 48."—Prayer Book.

This is an anticipation, however, and the only reason for mentioning Miss Ensor here is a desire to prevent any notion springing up in a casual reader, that she might be identical with Clio, and that there had been an early attachment, especially as the former lady was actually married to another before the poet, viz., a Mr. Hawkins, whom I know only by name.

The supposition of Dyer returning from Italy only in 1740, prevents his biographies having any notices of him in the preceding years; and all I can say of him at this period must be derived from the scattered minutes he made in his pocket-books, which form miscellanies of extracts, thoughts, and maxims. Hitherto he had been a painter-now he turned farmer; and seems to have resided chiefly with his aunt, Miss Cocks of Mapleton, engaged in matters of husbandry. His books must tell their own tale :

"1729.-July 3. Bought South Sea Bonds, £100 each, interest paid to the 26th March, 1729, No. 685, 1017, 2236, 6129." [So he was not very much poverty-stricken.] "Took lodgings in Covent Garden, July 8th. At Mr. Pond's, Nov. 18. Left Mr Pond's and London, July 25. Came to Mapleton Aug. 1.

"1734."-[This book is full of husbandry matters.]-"Came to Mapleton 23d April. Paid Lady Williams £52. May 2.-Lent my aunt, to pay Mr. Haylings, £20. Lent brother Bennet £3 5s." [Then follow the expenses of a hop-yard he seems to have cultivated at Mapleton.]

66

May 29, 1734.-I frequently wish I could abandon Mapleton with the fancied advantages of it; but the fear that by so doing my aunt would be involved with troubles confines me here."

[Aunt Cocks would appear, from the following fragment of a draft letter to her, to have been a fidgetty quarrelsome person, and doubtless Dyer had his own troubles with her :

"What would you have me do (for I hear of great complaints)? Would you have me injure myself, while you say you are doing me a kindness? You put things in a flattering light towards yourself and others, and I fear by a false prudence you will ever draw troubles upon yourself. Take, if you please, this my last proposal. Instead of a consideration for the chance of the hop-yardI'll insist not on the reversion of the three copyhold pieces Mapleton side of H. brook, for I own myself disgusted, but never will oblige myself to live with you at Mapleton-to have the house for myself, and let all things else stand as it was agreed on. If you comply with this, I'll endeavour to give all the assistance I can in paying off your private debts, and making you pass the rest of your life in quietness and happiness. This, indeed, I would beg you to do.

"I am about to grant a lease of the farm for 21 years or for lives. If 'tis disagreeable to any scheme you have, be pleased to let me know, and I won't do it, but will prefer any offer of yours which I shall think reasonable, and I'll wait a day or two for the favour of an answer."

"Gave Brother Bennet a bond for £100 ye 22d October.

"Mem. To get a copy of Aunt Wms. Bond I gave for J. Davies.*

Davies is an old name in Kidwelly. One John Davies of that place published, in 1672, the curious Rites and Monuments of the Church of Durham, collected out of. ancient MSS. about the time of the suppression.

"Took lodgings at Mr. Wilkinson's, Monday, 26th January, 1735. Agreed with the barber 31st Jan. Paid to Monday, 8th of March."

In 1735 and 1736 he was lending money to different people, and about this time was preparing a large commercial map of England, of which hereafter. In 1737 he was paying hop-yard expenses incurred in 1734, and in 1739 was also in England, for there occurs this date affixed to some political remarks, in a book of exactly the same writing, entitled, "The Geography of the Counties, their lengths and breadths, surface and soil-Reflections on the several Counties of England and Wales, with regard to trade, &c. : occasioned by a question, Whether 'tis possible to maintain the rights and extend the trade of a Nation without tricks, frauds, and villany in the Ministers?" In this little MS. an immense number of extracts, schemes, and remarks are congregated; and as he was now also finishing the "Ruins of Rome," striking out the general idea of the Fleece, and studying for the church, this period was doubtless one of the busiest in the poet's career.

"Grongar Hill" was published in 1727. Quite as early, or perhaps earlier, are "The Country Walk," before referred to, and "To Aurelia" (in MS.), begging her to leave the town, "though pleasant spring is blown," for the country:

"Come, Aurelia, come and see

What a seat is decked for thee;
But the seat you cannot see,

'Tis so hid with jessamy,

With the vine that o'er the walls,

And in every window crawls.

Of the same writing is an invitation to some of his London relatives (in MS.):

"From social converse of the town,

And dearer friends of Marybone,"

to breathe the mountain air, and view the green hills and flowery vales of Cambria, wherein he once more wanders to where

"Towy, in whose crystal wave,

The train of Cambrian Genii lave,
Flows gently on, with conscious pride,
Views fertile plains on either side,
And thence, collecting many a rill,

Paints the fair fields of Grongar Hill;"

which he mounts, and pictures again its various prospects, with much more preciseness, but less grace, than in his well-known description of it; and while his friends would admire what he loved so much—the verdant charms of a Welsh landscape

Maria's

Cleora's hospitable care,

At home provides the frugal fare;"

with a description of which he concludes.

1728.-" Occasioned by the behaviour of some of the Hereford Clergy, 1728."

June, 1735.

"I hate the proud; the reptile of an hour,
Whose little life is insolence, I spurn:
I scorn him more (ridiculous vain thing!)
Than the lone idiot, outcast of his kind,
The naked mark of laughter! but alas,
Alas poor brother! why disdain I thee?
Thine is no crime, yet be it-Pride alone
Is that mean vice to be chastised with scorn."

.-"Too much my soul hath fastened on the World," &c., a short piece in blank verse.

The following are without date, though all doubtless before 1740, which year forms a sort of epoch in Dyer's life. "An Epistle to a famous Painter," (see altered readings and additions occur in the MSS.

"British Poets.") A few

"To Aaron Hill, Esq., on his Poem called Gideon." Mr. Hill, in a poem entitled "The Choice-to Mr. Dyer" (both these are in the

"British Poets"), names Dyer thus:

"While charm'd with Aberglasney's quiet plains,
The Muses and their empress court your strains,
Tir'd of the noisy town, so lately tryed,
Methinks I see you smile on Towy's side!
Pensive, her mazy wanderings you unwind,
And, on your river's margin, calm your mind.
Oh!-greatly bless'd-whate'er your fate requires,
Your ductile wisdom tempers your desires!
Balanced within, you look abroad serene,

And marking both extremes, pass clear between."

"The Cambro-Briton," a fragmentary description of a friend, a contented shepherd poet of Wales, blank verse.

Query, does the following scrap relate to himself?

"From travell'd realms the curious swain returns,
Sees a fair face, imagines charms, and burns ;
Pure in his passion, tries each modest art,
And every chaste embrace, to win her heart.
Blest lover, blest in thy mistake, rejoice!
Blest in repulse; and now no more thy choice
Be the false beauties of a face or voice:
But softness, plainness, nobleness of mind;
But clear sweet sense, by easy art refined;

But bright good-natured wit, and Myrat shall be kind.
E'en now the Graces, for thy longing arms,
Profusely deck her with unfading charms."

To Celia :

And dances in her eyes! delicious view!
The rest which is but handsome, Venus drew."

"Oh, to my bosom Celia come,

For I am thine, thy gentle home,
And thou art mine, my better part;

Why, Nature made thee of my heart."

What had got Clio? I am afraid Dyer was fickle, like his brethren poets. The following has too much truth in it:

"Adieu, sweet vision! fled how soon!
Farewell, beauty-ah, ye blind!
Deck ye the flower that fades at noon,
And not th' immortal mind?

"See the fair shrine of virtue, where it lies
In the cold grave-that face and mien!
O grief! one little hour we mourn and praise
The next, forget and sin.

"See dead, poor Phillis, yesterday's delight!
Among the fair and is there sorrow?
Ah now, my lovely Celia, now e'er night,
What graces wilt thou wear to-morrow?"

"Nature in the Wilderness, a poem ;"-a few heads defined.

Had Dyer had more perseverance, and finished the many schemes he contemplated, and of which he only struck out the main ideas, he would now have ranked far higher in the scale of British poets. His energies were, like those of too many persons at the present day, wasted in small and unimportant effusions.

Durlington, October 1847.

HISTORIC RUINS.

Castle-Connell, co. Limerick.

THERE is, perhaps, no period of English history which, when contemplated in relation to remote and permanent results, possesses a more interesting or important character than that of the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland; an event which, though immediately arising from the ambition of a Plantagenet and the vices of an Irish monarch, constituted, in reality, an indispensable preliminary to the formation of that vast empire, and world-embracing influence, which England subsequently achieved. In support of this proposition, it becomes merely necessary to observe, that had the condition of Ireland, as a distinct and completely independent sovereignty, remained intact and inviolate, England could not have embodied those armies, and established that formidable marine, which have so powerfully co-operated in the production and maintenance of that supremacy, which, identified, as it were, with the principles of civilization, would seem to run parallel with the universal interests of mankind. Independently of this consideration, it is abundantly evident, that in the event of Ireland having been subjugated by a foreign power at any time hostile to England, or in a state of alliance with one indisposed to maintain friendly relations, consequences perhaps of the most calamitous description might have arisen. The invasion, therefore, of Ireland, together with her subsequent absorption in the British empire, is justly entitled to be regarded as a proceeding highly important indeed as an abstract consideration, but assuming, in its multiplied bearings and enduring influence, an aspect of paramount and transcendant gravity. The reflections associated with this view of the subject are, confessedly, manifold and interesting. The establishment of our colossal Indian empire-the overthrow of the Napoleon dynasty—the usurpation of the red man's forest-home and boundless hunting-grounds-the establishment of the star-spangled banner's broad empire-the colonization of Southern Africa-the transposition of Anglican energy to the island-continent of Australia, and polynesian groups of the far-off Pacific-the train and combination of circumstances, and other instrumentalities, which seem destined ultimately to confer on the language of Great Britain a worldwide universality, may be legitimately recognised as forming a portion of the veritable results deriving themselves from that distant but prolific

source.

Associations such as these are eminently calculated to invest, as with an encircling halo, the mouldering ruins of those castellated structures, erected by the early Norman adventurers in attestation of their pretensions to rule and retain the ample domains, for whose possession they were indebted to their trusty blades alone. Consecrated by their antiquity, they present to the imaginative and well-informed, an extrinsic charm and character, and awaken a host of long-buried memories, in the past-irradiating splendour of which, the mailed warrior and haughty dame, the beleaguered fortress and prostrate suppliant, the baron's revelry and the victim's dungeon, spring into unreal but poetically palpable existence.